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Dogs water needs differ in summer, winter, autumn and spring.

Because humans get more thirsty during the summer months we often realise that our dogs are more thirsty and need water stops in dog parks more often, at least on each lap.

But a dog's physiology is much different from a humans and so are their water demands.

As many people know, dogs pant because they dont have sweat glands all over their bodies like mammals and humans.

This means they cool themselves by expelling heat from their mouth and through the sweat glands on the pads of their feet (why the like to keep their feet in water in summer).

Summer dog water needs

Besides the obvious of not locking dogs in cars and providing a cool place around your house, and buckets of water so they always have access to clean plentiful water. People often forget that their dogs are inside with them a lot of the time at night.

If you have reverse cycle air conditioning, it extracts moisture from the air. Set your temp at 22 degrees and you will feel cool, but this coupled with moisture being extracted from the air can fool a human and a dogs common sense to drink plenty of water, leaving your dog dehydrated.

Dog food dehydration - If you feed your dog grain pellets or any low meat content dog food, the pellets suck water out of the dogs system. The dogs digestive system is geared for meat and to expel waste quickly from its body (a fraction of the time of our expelling, because they have a very short intestine). While some dogs get bloat and can die from the swelling of food in their stomach, many dogs get more thirsty than natural because the grain has removed excess water from their system.

Winter dog water needs

I always encourage my dog to drink regardless of the time of year.

If a dog is running hard in winter (as tehy are more likely to do as they dont overheat as easily). they may forget to drink and get dehydrated. If they dehydrate waste in their cells and organs and intestine stay in their body longer and can lead to infection.

If you have central heating, this unnaturally excessively dries out your dogs insides and skin. Women might condition their skin, but most people forget that their dogs, particularly those with skin allergies can suffer more in winter than summer because of excessive house heating - and even the dogs liking to lie right next to your heater !

SPRING AND AUTUMN DOG WATER NEEDS

These in-between seasons can be just as tricky. A dog coming into autumn is feeling the temperature cool down, will run around more, and again need more water.

A dog in spring will be running as hard as they did in winter, but because it is warmer they will need more water in the dog park. Add to that dog allergy conditions such as new grasses in the dog park, also means that a dogs system can benefit from ore water to flush its body of histamines or the excess mucus etc created from its allergy reactions.

Water is a dogs best friend

Unlike humans who have many beverages, a dog can live happlily exclusively drinking clean cool water. they can get calcium from puppy milk mixtures, but if you feed them enough raw bones as part of their diet they are going to get a very natural source of calcium.

If a dog mostly consumes one type of food for life (most owners feed grain dog food) and one type of beverage which is absolutely vital to their healthy functioning, better make sure its always fresh that day, and always readily available !

Excess consumption of water or two little measn you might need to visit a vet !

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